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The Mastery of Narratively Creating Mental Maps: Literary Cartography in Karl May’s Œuvre

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Mapping Different Geographies

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Geoinformation and Cartography ((LNGC))

Abstract

The biographic background and the art of landscape description of Karl May, one of the most prominent European travel writers and novelists is presented. Based on meticulous studies of up-to-date atlases and geographic scientific publications he developed most realistic depictions of the settings of his novels which are, in most cases, first-person narratives. Having influenced generations of not only Germanspeaking young readers – myself included – May’s art of combining an accurate geographic background with totally imaginary and even fanciful plots is presented and scrutinized. Various examples are given.

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Acknowledgements

The author wants to thank Barbara Piatti, ETH Zurich, for having aroused his sensitivity to investigate something which, for a long time, he has been both aware of and interested in.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Cartography, Dresden University of Technology, Dresden, Germany

    Manfred Buchroithner

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  1. Manfred Buchroithner
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Correspondence to Manfred Buchroithner .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Inst. Geographie und Regionalforschung, Universität Wien, Universitätsstr. 7, Wien, 1010, Austria

    Karel Kriz

  2. Dept. Land Information, RMIT University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    William Cartwright

  3. Institut für Kartographie, ETH Zürich, Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 15, Zürich, 8093, Switzerland

    Lorenz Hurni

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Buchroithner, M. (2011). The Mastery of Narratively Creating Mental Maps: Literary Cartography in Karl May’s Œuvre. In: Kriz, K., Cartwright, W., Hurni, L. (eds) Mapping Different Geographies. Lecture Notes in Geoinformation and Cartography. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-15537-6_15

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